10 Books That Will Fry Your Mind This Summer

Grant Morrison has a hell of a tale to tell: The graphic novelist who co-created Batman's twisted game-changer Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth tripped on psilocybin mushrooms, fought movie execs to keep the Joker in high heels and reaped the benefits of going 50 hours without sleep in order to better access his unconscious.

It's all in his memoir Supergods, one of 10 new books included in Wired.com's summer reading roundup. These ink-on-paper slabs encompass everything from cerebral sci-fi to the nonfiction adventures of a man who sailed the Pacific in a 60-foot boat made of plastic water bottles. We've also excerpted the first sentence of George R.R. Martin's long-awaited fantasy novel, A Dance With Dragons and sweetened the pot with a Constructing Green Lantern giveaway.

Check the gallery above to preview beach-friendly tomes that might just rewire your brain cells long after the sunburns fade from view.

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Supergods

Author: Grant Morrison

Big idea: Subtitled What Masked Vigilantes, Miraculous Mutants, and a Sun God from Smallville Can Teach Us About Being Human, this trippy autobiography-cum-critical essay gathers up deep thoughts and otherworldly hallucinations experienced by the comics writer who became rich and famous after co-creating the Batman best-seller Arkham Asylum.

Sample text: "I stayed up late to induce delirium.... At four thirty in the morning after fifty hours writing without sleep, I ransacked my dream diaries and most frightening childhood memories for content. In the end ... I delivered what felt like the kind of high-level comic book I knew was possible and showed that the serious superhero story didn't always have to be realistic."

Embassytown

Author: China Miéville

Big idea: Alien life forms cohabitate a distant planet with human colonists, including Avice Benner Cho. She straddles both worlds from a unique perspective: Unable to speak the bizarre language used by the Ariekei, she functions as a "living figure of speech" for the aliens.

Sample text: "There was a Hostnest in fine alien colors tethered by creaking ropes of muscle to a stockade, that in some affectation the Hosts had fashioned like one of our weaker fences. I'd creep up on it while my friends whistled from the crossroads ... [past] breezes sculpted with nanotech particle-machines and consummate atmosphere artistry."

A Dance With Dragons

Author: George R.R. Martin

Big idea:A Song of Ice and Fire — introduced this spring to TV viewers thanks to HBO's Game of Thrones, an adaption of the fantasy series' first book — finally adds a fifth installment detailing the fractious clans and dragons that wreak havoc in the land of Westeros.

Daniel O'Thunder

Author: Ian Weir

Big idea: In the back alleys of 1850s London, a prize fighter-turned-evangelist goes after the devil, armed with a fabled "Hammer of Heaven" right-hand punch.

Sample text: "I discovered that my feet were kicking and dangling. This was owing to the fact that I had been hoisted by the windpipe and slammed back against the wall with a force that made the timbers shake and my teeth rattle."

Machine Man

Big idea: Crowdsourced with reader input during 37 weeks of online postings, this nanotechnology adventure follows a man who becomes obsessed with bionic limbs after one of his legs is hacked off in a factory accident. (The Machine Man book cover will be selected by fans from one of the six illustrations shown above).

Sample text: "I spent a lot of time being jabbed by needles. Not syringes. Tiny steel slivers with embedded electrodes. The idea was to insert these into my truncated thighs so they could read signals from my brain, and translate them into motorized movements."

Medium Is the Massage

Author: Marshall McLuhan and Quentin Fiore

Big idea: Re-issued in paperback (with a new cover by Shepard Fairey) to commemorate McLuhan's 100th birthday, this "Inventory of Effects" remains remarkably prescient as it analyzes the early onset of the Information Age's nervous breakdown.

Sample text: "Electric circuitry has overthrown the regime of 'time' and 'space' and pours upon us constantly the concerns of all other men."

The True Adventures of the World's Greatest Stuntman

Author: Vic Armstrong

Big idea: Stunt double for Tom Cruise, Harrison Ford and Arnold Schwarzenegger remembers the action and accidents over the course of three James Bond movies, Mission: Impossible 3 and dozens of other films.

Sample text: "Bond has to hijack a jet fighter.... We arranged for real jets to approach our runway and touch the ground literally for a split second, before roaring off again.... It was bloody dangerous for us standing at the end of the runway with the camera. When you see these things coming at you from half a mile away you suddenly realise how fast 160 mph is, especially when they roar over your head at about ten feet. And if the pilot doesn't lift up in time or doesn't get enough speed, we're all goners."

Plastiki

Author: David de Rothschild

Big idea: To raise awareness about floating garbage that soils the ocean with an average 46,000 pieces of litter for every square mile of water surface, environmentalist de Rothschild builds a boat from12,500 recycled plastic bottles and sails 12,000 miles from San Francisco to Sydney.

Sample text: "Water was very much on my mind.... I slowly marinated in its salty residue, which had invaded my every pore. I was parched and really, really wanted to go for a swim but wasn't allowed."

Constructing Green Lantern

Author: Ozzy Inguanzo

Big idea: Handsomely produced companion piece to Ryan Reynolds'Green Lantern movie, this coffee table book blends commentary by behind-the-scenes talent with storyboard art, character sketches, concept art and still photos from the set.

Sample text: "The tailored green and black suit [Hal] Jordan wakes up in is not made of fabric, or rubber, or anything recognizable from our physical world.... For inspiration [costume designer Ngila] Dickson ... observed marine creatures like the tuna and even chartered a field trip to Sea World in San Diego to examine a dolphin's skin texture up close."

Win Constructing Green Lantern Book

Wired.com is teaming with Rizzoli New York to give away one free copy of Constructing Green Lantern ($35). The 209-page hardcover volume illustrates the transformation of DC Comics' intergalactic crime fighter from comic page to big screen.

To qualify for the contest, comment below on the following question: X-Men: First Class versus Green Lantern: Which summer superhero movie are you more psyched about?

Deadline to enter is 12:01 a.m. Pacific on May 31, 2011. A randomly selected winner will be notified by e-mail or Twitter. Note: If you do not have an e-mail address or Twitter handle associated with your Disqus login, you must include contact information in your comment to be eligible. Any winner who does not respond to Wired.com's notification within 72 hours will forfeit the prize.

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